by Gordon Jack
Her dad nodded. “It’s got a transmission range of up to four-point-three miles.”
“What about sound? Can it pick up sound?”
“Not really,” he said. “Why? You want to spy on your enemies?” He laughed.
“I don’t have any enemies, Dad,” Stacey said, deadpan, thinking of her mom’s advice from their last meeting. “Just competitors.”
Stacey had a hard time focusing on anything but her lunch with Priya. She texted Brian about the meeting, and he promised to be there. We can work on your speech too, he wrote back. I’ve got some ideas.
Ever since the cupcake fiasco, Brian had been working overtime to help Stacey regain some lost ground. Yesterday, he informed the administration about the flagrant health violations taking place in the cafeteria and effectively shut down Tony’s campaign headquarters. He also went to another GSA club meeting to advocate on her behalf. Now he was helping her with her speech in anticipation of next week’s school assembly, in which all candidates had three minutes to make their cases in front of the voting public. He really was a true friend.
As soon as the bell rang for lunch, Stacey sprinted to the library and grabbed one of the tables near the back, away from the prying eyes of the librarian. Brian arrived a few minutes later and sat down next to her.
“Based on my polling,” he started, getting right down to business, “voters are most enthusiastic about your promise to change the cell phone policy.”
“You’re polling students?” Stacey asked, surprised.
“I conducted an informal focus group during English,” Brian said, dropping his hand into his open backpack on the floor and removing an apple slice. The library had a strict no-eating policy, so they had to sneak their food while the librarian was monitoring the other side of the room.
“But I don’t know if I can change the cell phone policy,” Stacey whispered. She looked around and hoped no one was eavesdropping on their strategy session. The library was filling up with students, and the last thing she needed was another leak. “I spoke with Buckley about it in passing, and she’s pretty inflexible on the topic.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Brian said. “As long as people see you fighting for change, they will support you.”
“What about my experience? Neither candidate has done as much for the school as I have. That should count for something. As vice president, I’ve nearly doubled the number of clubs on campus.”
Brian looked at her. “So you’re the one responsible for the Improv Everywhere Club?”
“I had no idea they would perform at every assembly!”
“Just sayin’. Be careful what you brag about. I think it’s safer to run on the future, rather than the past.”
Stacey sighed. “Fine. Oh look, there’s Priya.”
The two of them watched as the diminutive girl, eyes focused on her phone, stumbled into a book display on mindfulness. Without looking away from the screen in front of her, she redirected herself and moved toward Stacey and Brian’s table.
“Is she following directions on Google Maps?” Brian asked.
“Maybe. She’s probably got five or six screens open right now.”
Priya bounced between tables like a slow-moving pinball until she reached where Stacey and Brian were sitting. Brian pulled a chair out for her, worried that she might miss the seat and land on the carpeted floor.
“Hi, Priya,” Stacey said. “You know Brian, right?”
Brian felt his phone buzz and saw the Priya had just followed him on Twitter and Instagram. A second later, he got a friend request on Facebook.
“I do now,” she said. “By the way, you don’t have Snapchat?”
Brian rolled his eyes.
“Priya has been doing some opposition research for me,” Stacey explained. “Digging into Tony’s and Julia’s digital pasts to see if there’s anything useful.”
“What? Why?” Brian said.
“Mom said I need to know my enemies,” Stacey said.
“Oh, you talked to your mom lately?” Brian asked. Stacey noticed his voice went up a few octaves.
“Not since last weekend,” Stacey said. “We’re going bridesmaid dress shopping on Sunday.” Stacey made a face like someone who’s just swallowed a horsefly.
“I saw her the other day,” Brian said. “Shopping at Nordstrom.”
“Not in the Bridal section, I hope,” Stacey said.
“Ha! Good one. Actually, I was shopping for a present. For my mom. For her birthday.”
“Her birthday’s not until July,” Stacey said. She knew because it was two days after her own. They were both Cancers and gave each other crab-themed cards every year.
“Yeah, I know that. I like to start early. You know, for the sales?” Brian squirmed in his seat like he had to go to the bathroom.
“You want to hear what I found or what?” Priya said, staring at them with a bored expression. Given the speed with which Priya processed information, Stacey probably appeared to her like a slug does to a hummingbird.
“Yes, of course,” Stacey said.
“Okay. Let’s start with Tony. He was easy. There are, like, a billion selfies of him taking bong hits on his feed,” Priya said. She slid her tiny fingers across her phone and sent Stacey a photo album filled with images of Tony smoking, drinking, and posing like a Chinese Snoop Dogg.
Brian scooted his chair next to Stacey to see the photos. “How many bongs does the guy have?” he asked as Stacey swiped through the montage of party shots.
“I like the one shaped like a bear-shaped honey jar,” Stacey said, zooming in on a shot of Tony sucking smoke out of the yellow dispenser top. “These were just out there?”
“Yup,” Priya said. “For a guy who parties as much as he does, he has surprisingly few followers, although that number has gone up recently. He seems to be trending high with freshmen boys.”
“That’s my brother’s influence,” Brian said.
“They seem to like his take on genitalia,” Priya said. Her fingers glided over her screen again. Seconds later, Stacey’s in-box was flooded with screenshots of Tony’s tweets about his member.
“If there’s a dick pic, please don’t forward it to me,” Stacey said.
“There’s not,” Priya said.
“What about Julia?” Stacey said, leaning forward.
Priya’s large brown eyes crossed in response to Stacey’s question. “She’s weird,” she said, swiping screens to the left to get to Julia’s info. “Up until last week, there’s nothing. I mean, zero. Is there, like, no social media in Canada?”
“There’s definitely social media in Canada,” Stacey said.
“Maybe she’s just a lurker,” Brian offered.
“She’s got a good number of followers,” Priya said. “Almost as many as you.”
Stacey was about to say something, but Brian put a hand on her shoulder and stopped her.
“I did find one interesting thing,” Priya said. “Julia’s friends with her aunt, who’s white by the way.”
“Yeah, so?” Brian said, a bit defensively in Stacey’s opinion. “Julia’s biracial.”
“She’s not friends with her mom, but I was able to check out her mom’s page through the aunt. Neither woman knows how to use privacy blocks. Adults are so lame with this stuff.”
“What did you find?” Stacey said.
“No mention of Julia’s dad. Like anywhere.”
“Maybe they had a bitter divorce,” Stacey said. Like her own parents. The day Mom moved out, Dad removed all the photos of her from the walls and replaced them with Dorothea Lange photographs of migrant farmworkers.
“Yeah, but wouldn’t there be a shot of him somewhere? There are photos of nearly every one of Julia’s birthdays, and there’s not a brown guy anywhere.”
“I don’t think that means anything,” Brian said.
“It’s just weird, is all,” Priya said, shrugging. “Especially with all the mom’s posts on the rotting Y chromosome and the perfume
of female power.”
“What does that even mean?” Brian asked.
“She doesn’t think men are necessary,” Stacey said, quoting the title of a book she had long been curious about. The paperback was sandwiched between her mom’s cookbooks and fitness guides until she moved out.
“So, her mom’s a feminist,” Brian said. “You want to use that against her?”
“Did you see any photos or posts reflecting Latino culture?” Stacey asked. “Any music, food, or clothing?”
“Nothing,” Priya said. “Julia’s upbringing, at least based on her mom’s posts, was pretty white.”
“Stacey,” Brian said. “You can’t use this information. It’s worthless. You don’t like tea and crumpets; that doesn’t mean you’re not English.”
“I’m not running as an Anglophile,” Stacey said.
“It’s still wrong,” Brian said, nearly shouting. He got an aggressive shush from the passing librarian. “And it will backfire, I promise,” he continued, dropping his voice to a whisper. “You can win this race by not going negative.”
“Not with two candidates splitting the vote,” Stacey said. “If one of them drops out, I can win the majority.”
“Then go after Tony,” Brian said. “His crimes are clearly visible. He’s been advertising his love of pot and dick for all to see.”
“But don’t you see?” Stacey said. “If Julia vandalized her own poster, her not being Latina makes her crime even more heinous. Not only did she appropriate the Latino culture, she also engineered her own victimhood in order to get a sympathy vote.”
“Julia’s voters will not come over to your side,” Brian said. “Especially if you accuse her of not being a ‘real Latina.’”
Stacey didn’t like how he put that last bit in air quotes, but she knew he was right. Tony was the safer one to attack. She just so wanted to expose Julia for the liar she was.
“Let’s repost one of Tony’s bong hit photos,” Stacey said finally. “With the caption ‘Is this who we want leading our school?’”
Priya tapped her phone. “Done,” she said, and went back to swiping.
27
THREE DAYS TILL ELECTION DAY
“DUDE, CAN WE come in?” Doug said over the case of beer he was holding.
Tony stared at the four guys standing on his doorstep and hesitated. It was Saturday evening, and he hadn’t received any communication from Doug saying he was bringing his buddies to the house, but then people often dropped by unannounced, especially when Tony’s parents were out of town. He swung the giant front door open, and welcomed the foursome into his palatial home.
“Holy fuck,” the pudgy guy holding the shopping bag full of mixers said. “This place is ginormous.” Tony had seen the guy around school. He thought he remembered reading something about him winning a golf title.
Tony led them through the two-story entry and into the kitchen, where they began their opening, pouring, and mixing.
“Dude, what’s with all this chocolate milk?” Doug asked, trying to find space in Tony’s refrigerator for the beer. Tony had just figured out how to get groceries delivered through Amazon and had stocked his shelves with cartons of Space Cow. He walked over and created some room for the cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon that Doug had brought over.
“What’ll you have, Tony?” Doug asked, holding up a beer and bottle of vodka. Tony had already gotten pretty high while watching Walking Dead reruns, so he grabbed the beer. Plus, he loved the sound of opening carbonated beverages.
After everyone had a drink, they moved out to the pool area and sat around a sparkling glass table. The setting sun tinted everything golden. The boys drank and watched Tony’s terrier chase squirrels on the manicured golf course of a lawn. It was peaceful and quiet, and for a moment Tony was content just being present in the beauty of his backyard.
“Should we invite some girls over?” the short, stocky guy with the swimmer’s hair said. Tony stared at the scrubby beard the dude was trying to grow and wondered why you never see swimmers with facial hair.
“Is that cool, Tony?” Doug asked.
Tony shrugged. “I guess.” He hadn’t invited these guys over; he supposed it didn’t matter if they brought some dates.
“Cool,” Doug said, and nodded in the direction of Swimmer Beard, who immediately started texting.
The boys finished their drinks, and Pudgy Golfer went to get refills. Before they started on their second round, Doug raised his glass and toasted Tony. “To our next school president,” he said. When did Doug lose his braces? Tony wondered. His teeth seemed unnaturally white all of a sudden.
The guys cheered and slammed their glasses and cans against one another.
“I’m not going to be president,” Tony said.
“People love you,” the fourth guy said. Tony tried to think of a nickname for him, but there was nothing distinguishing about his appearance; he looked like every other white guy to Tony, so he called him Matthew McConaughey.
“Have you seen the comments on your photo?” Doug asked. He held his phone up to Tony’s face. On the screen was a photo of Tony exhaling an insane amount of smoke from a bong hit. When was that photo taken? Tony couldn’t recall. He was pretty sure it was back in September, when his parents left him for their cruise down the Yangtze.
Underneath the photo was the caption “Is this who we want leading our school?” Doug scrolled down the page so Tony could read the answers. Almost every one of the 143 comments was an enthusiastic yes.
“Tony’s got my vote.”
“Here’s some change I can believe in.”
“Make America baked again.”
So this was why everyone had been high-fiving him in the halls yesterday, Tony suddenly realized. It seemed like he was especially popular Friday afternoon. Strangers called out his name and pointed in his direction. One girl asked him to sign her Spanish textbook. Tony thought all the extra attention was because the administration had banned him from the cafeteria for a week. But it was because of this dumb photo that had been posted and shared throughout the school.
“That’s fucking . . .” Tony couldn’t figure out how to finish the sentence—hilarious? Pathetic? Sad?—so he took a long drink of beer instead.
“You gonna have an election party?” Pudgy Golfer asked.
“A what?” Tony asked.
“Dude, you have to have a blowout when you become president,” Doug said. “Make it epic and shit.”
“Totally,” Swimmer Beard said.
“I don’t know,” Tony said. “My parents are coming back soon.”
“When?” Pudgy Golfer said.
Tony didn’t know. His dad had told him, but it was so far in the future, Tony didn’t bother to write it down. He was pretty sure it was in May sometime. “Not for a couple weeks.”
“Bruh, the election is next week,” Doug said. “You have to have a party to thank all your supporters.” Doug raised his glass and toasted the other guys, supporters presumably, at the table.
“But not my brother,” Matthew McConaughey said. “That little fucker threatened to tell my mom about the money I took from her purse if I didn’t vote for you.”
“No shit!” Pudgy Golfer said. “My brother said he’d do my chores for a week if I voted for Tony. How’d you get such a devoted army of slaves?”
“I’m fighting for their rights,” Tony said, which caused everyone at the table to burst out laughing.
“You can’t invite them to the party,” Swimmer Beard said. “It’s a serious liability.”
Tony wanted to say he never invited anyone to his parties; people just showed up. He wasn’t sure what point this response would make though. There was something in his head about nature abhorring a vacuum. Tony, like his empty house, was a thing that needed to be filled. It didn’t matter who came over—Mohawk or Pudgy Golfer—it was all the same to him.
The distant sound of the doorbell made Doug and McConaughey bolt from their chairs to greet the new guests.
A few seconds later, they returned with five girls and a new guy. Tony groaned thinking of all the nicknames he’d have to create to help him distinguish one guest from another. Easier to go get his bong and smoke upstairs.
Tony stumbled past his guests with barely a nod and trudged up the marble stairs to his bedroom. Someone had figured out how to link their phone to his Bluetooth speakers and was blasting some shitty pop music. Tony sealed himself off from the party downstairs and dug through his closet for his bear-shaped honey bottle bong—the one featured in the photo that Doug had just shown him. He’d forgotten how much he liked this bong. It was cute and compact, easy to reload. He found it on the upper shelf, tucked behind his chess set.
He walked over to the window and opened it wide. His room looked down on the pool deck, and Tony watched Doug and the others mix and mingle with their drinks. Dropping onto the beanbag on the floor, he filled the bong with some excellent Ghost Train Haze and lit up. He inhaled deeply and felt a goofy smile return to his face. Tony Guo, president of the ASB. It was hilarious and sad at the same time. His parents would flip out when he told them. They had pretty much written him off as a failure. A bad investment they had to live with. Or not live with as it turned out. He wasn’t sure if he would welcome their renewed attention. In fact, it could be kind of a drag to listen to them nag him again about wasted potential.
Tony exhaled, being careful to blow the smoke out the open window. Maybe he should just quit. It’s not like he wanted to do this. Mohawk had done all the work. Tony just sat back and enjoyed the attention. But did he really enjoy the attention? He wasn’t sure. He kind of liked it in the cafeteria, where he could pretend to be someone important. Someone worth listening to. But at home, this interest bothered him. It felt more like an invasion of privacy than an honor bestowed on a great leader.
Tony took another hit, held it in, and blew the smoke outside. There was a difference between Mohawk and the guys downstairs. Mohawk saw a leader in Tony, someone with the potential to accomplish something great. All Doug and his friends saw when they looked at Tony was an empty house where they could get wasted.
